The Ethereum Foundation will enact a policy on conflicts of interest, Executive Director Aya Miyaguchi said on May 24. The announcement was made in response to controversy in the cryptocurrency community surrounding the connection between the foundation and EigenLayer developers.
Two Ethereum researchers joined the ranks of EigenFoundation’s paid advisors in the week before Miyaguchi’s announcement. Justin Drake announced his appointment at EigenFoundation in a lengthy X post on May 19th. He said he would receive “several million dollars” worth of incentives from EigenFoundation, but would put the money back into the Ethereum ecosystem. Dankrad Feist made a similarly lengthy announcement the next day. Feist admitted he received “a significant amount of tokens,” adding:
“I do not believe they will change or influence my position on how the core protocols should be developed. But I believe the community needs to know about this so they can hold me accountable.”
Both researchers said they were receiving posts personally and not as representatives of the Ethereum Foundation. Drake promised to “continue to take a critical stance against EigenLayer,” and Feist said he would “take a contrarian view.” Reactions to the researchers’ move were mixed. ZkSecurity co-founder David Wong tweeted about Drake at
“This is the next level of transparency. You really have to love the sincerity of EF people. “I don’t know if we deserve these people.”
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However, many netizens reacted skeptically. “Are you serious? He released it because Cobie leaked it,” responded Wong. Cryptocurrency trader Jordan Fish, also known as Cobie, asked Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin about EigenLayer’s relationship with employees of his foundation the day before Drake revealed his advisory position. Another person asked Feist:
“You’re keeping 20M for yourself but don’t believe in the power of incentives? (…) lol”
Miyaguchi said in his “I’m here,” he said. She promised she would have more information soon.
Drake said there is a third Ethereum Foundation member who is associated with EigenFoundation as an investor. He did not identify the person.
EigenLayer is an Ethereum layer-2 re-staking protocol that allows Ethereum node operators and validators to earn fees by re-staking liquid Ether (ETH) they receive in return for staking. They can place those assets on an EVM platform like Lido (using the ETH they receive from that platform) or validate and secure other networks, such as sidechains or non-EVM blockchains. So you can stake the same asset twice.
EigenLayer was launched on the Ethereum Goerli testnet in April 2023 and partially launched on the mainnet in April.
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